The ''Annunciation'' is a painting widely attributed to the

Italian Renaissance The Italian Renaissance ( it, Rinascimento ) was a period in Italian history covering the 15th and 16th centuries. The period is known for the initial development of the broader Renaissance culture that spread across Europe and marked the tra ...

artist

Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially re ...

, dated to . Leonardo's earliest extant major work, it was completed in

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico ...

while he was an apprentice in the studio of

Andrea del Verrocchio Andrea del Verrocchio (, , ; – 1488), born Andrea di Michele di Francesco de' Cioni, was a sculptor, Italian painter and goldsmith who was a master of an important workshop in Florence. He apparently became known as ''Verrocchio'' after the ...

. The painting was made

oil An oil is any nonpolar chemical substance that is composed primarily of hydrocarbons and is hydrophobic (does not mix with water) & lipophilic (mixes with other oils). Oils are usually flammable and surface active. Most oils are unsaturate ...

and

tempera Tempera (), also known as egg tempera, is a permanent, fast-drying painting medium consisting of colored pigments mixed with a water-soluble binder medium, usually glutinous material such as egg yolk. Tempera also refers to the paintings done ...

on a large poplar

panel Panel may refer to: Arts and media Visual arts *Panel (comics), a single image in a comic book, comic strip or cartoon; also, a comic strip containing one such image * Panel painting, in art, either one element of a multi-element piece of art ...

and depicts the Annunciation, a popular biblical subject in 15th-century Florence. Since 1867 it has been housed in the

Uffizi The Uffizi Gallery (; it, Galleria degli Uffizi, italic=no, ) is a prominent art museum located adjacent to the Piazza della Signoria in the Historic Centre of Florence in the region of Tuscany, Italy. One of the most important Italian museums ...

in Florence, the city where it was created. Though the work has been criticized for inaccuracies in its composition, it is among the best known portrayals of the

Annunciation in Christian art The Annunciation has been one of the most frequent subjects of Christian art. Depictions of the Annunciation go back to early Christianity, with the Priscilla catacomb in Rome including the oldest known fresco of the Annunciation, dating to the ...

Description

The subject matter of the work is drawn from

Luke People *Luke (given name), a masculine given name (including a list of people and characters with the name) * Luke (surname) (including a list of people and characters with the name) *Luke the Evangelist, author of the Gospel of Luke. Also known a ...

1.26–39. It depicts the angel

Gabriel In Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity and Islam), Gabriel (); Greek: grc, Γαβριήλ, translit=Gabriḗl, label=none; Latin: ''Gabriel''; Coptic: cop, Ⲅⲁⲃⲣⲓⲏⲗ, translit=Gabriêl, label=none; Amharic: am, ገብ� ...

announcing to Mary that she would conceive miraculously and give birth to a son to be named

Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religiou ...

and called "the Son of God", whose reign would never end. The subject of the annunciation was very popular for contemporaneous artworks painted in Christian countries such as Italy and had been depicted many times in Florentine art, including several examples by the Early Renaissance painter

Fra Angelico Fra Angelico (born Guido di Pietro; February 18, 1455) was an Italian painter of the Early Renaissance, described by Vasari in his '' Lives of the Artists'' as having "a rare and perfect talent".Giorgio Vasari, ''Lives of the Artists''. Pengu ...

. Details of the commission for the painting and its early history remain obscure. The marble table in front of Mary probably is derived from the tomb of Piero and Giovanni de' Medici in the

Basilica of San Lorenzo, Florence The Basilica di San Lorenzo (Basilica of St. Lawrence) is one of the largest churches of Florence, Italy, situated at the centre of the main market district of the city, and it is the burial place of all the principal members of the Medici fami ...

, which Verrocchio had sculpted during this same period. The angel holds a

Madonna lily ''Lilium candidum'', the Madonna lily or white lily, is a plant in the true lily family. It is native to the Balkans and Middle East, and naturalized in other parts of Europe, including France, Italy, and Ukraine, and in North Africa, the Canary ...

, a symbol of Mary's virginity as well as that of the city of Florence. It is presumed that, being a keen observer of nature, Leonardo painted the wings of the angel to resemble those of a bird in flight, but later, the wings were lengthened dramatically by another artist. Although this is the earliest known commissioned painting by Leonardo, it has been pointed out that the painting already bears characteristics that are described as demonstrating his signature work, the innovations he introduced in his paintings:

sfumato Sfumato (, ) is a painting technique for softening the transition between colours, mimicking an area beyond what the human eye is focusing on, or the out-of-focus plane. It is one of the canonical painting modes of the Renaissance. Leonardo da ...

and atmospheric perspective.

Modern history

Following

Gustav Waagen Gustav Friedrich Waagen (11 February 1794 – 15 July 1868) was a German art historian. His opinions were greatly respected in England, where he was invited to give evidence before the royal commission inquiring into the condition and future o ...

methods in 1869, Baron Liphart identified this '' Annunciation'', that newly arrived in the

Uffizi Gallery The Uffizi Gallery (; it, Galleria degli Uffizi, italic=no, ) is a prominent art museum located adjacent to the Piazza della Signoria in the Historic Centre of Florence in the region of Tuscany, Italy. One of the most important Italian mus ...

from the church of San Bartolomeo a Monte Oliveto in Florence, as by the young Leonardo while he still was working in the studio of his master, Andrea del Verrocchio. Before that determination by Liphart the painting had been attributed to

Domenico Ghirlandaio Domenico di Tommaso Curradi di Doffo Bigordi (, , ; 2 June 1448 – 11 January 1494), professionally known as Domenico Ghirlandaio, also spelled as Ghirlandajo, was an Italian Renaissance painter born in Florence. Ghirlandaio was part of ...

. When the ''Annunciation'' came to the Uffizi in 1867, from the Olivetan monastery of San Bartolomeo near Florence, it was ascribed to

who, like Leonardo, was an apprentice in the workshop of

. In 1869,

Karl Eduard von Liphart Baron Karl Eduard von Liphart or Carl Eduard von Liphart (16 May 1808 – 15 February 1891) was a noted art expert and collector from Estonia. The family manor was near Dorpat (now Tartu). Life Liphart was born in Kambja Parish in the Kreis Dor ...

, the central figure of the German expatriate art colony in Florence, recognized the painting as a youthful work by Leonardo. It was one of the first attributions of a surviving work to the youthful Leonardo. Since then, a Leonardo drawing in a collection at Christ Church Picture Gallery in Oxford was recognized as a preparatory drawing for the sleeve of the angel, further supporting the attribution to Leonardo. Occasionally, some immaturity in Leonardo's painting technique is noted by art critics when discussing the spatial relationship between Mary and the desk and the marble table on which it rests.

Controversy

On March 12, 2007, the painting was at the center of a furor between Italian citizens and the Minister of Culture, who decided to loan the painting for an exhibition in Japan.

Gallery

File:Leonardo da Vinci 059.jpg, Background File:Leonardo da Vinci Annunciazione (dettaglio).jpg,

Angel Gabriel In Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity and Islam), Gabriel (); Greek: grc, Γαβριήλ, translit=Gabriḗl, label=none; Latin: ''Gabriel''; Coptic: cop, Ⲅⲁⲃⲣⲓⲏⲗ, translit=Gabriêl, label=none; Amharic: am, ገብ� ...

File:Leonardo da Vinci - Annunciazione (dettaglio).jpg,

Virgin Mary Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jews, Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Jose ...

File:Léonard de Vinci - Annonciation.jpg, Bible and the Virgin's hand

Notes

References

Sources

* * * *

External links

''Leonardo da Vinci: anatomical drawings from the Royal Library, Windsor Castle''
- the full The Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition catalog that is online as a PDF contains material on ''Annunciation'' (see index) {{Authority control 1470s paintings Paintings by Andrea del Verrocchio Leonardo Paintings in the collection of the Uffizi Paintings by Leonardo da Vinci Books in art Seashells in art Ships in art